Blood Shadows (22 page)

Nachari shrugged, suppressing a shudder. “Been there, done that. And frankly, I’m not impressed. Besides, my skin would just grow back, and it would waste a lot of time…” He glanced at her speculatively. “Your biological clock is ticking rather loudly, isn’t it, Noiro?” He laughed, his own chiding pointed and derisive. “As are the clocks of many other female demons down here, I might point out: Perhaps I’ve chosen the wrong female.”

Noiro gasped with indignation. “You promised!” she shouted.

“Shh,” Nachari warned. “Lower your tone. Do you want to draw Ademordna’s attention to our conversation?” For a moment, he thought about the high-stakes game he was playing with the wicked demoness: What if, for some ungodly reason, his plan didn’t work? What if he crafted his spell, took advantage of Noiro in order to escape the Valley of Death and Shadows, and it didn’t happen? He would be forced to remain in the underworld indefinitely, and Noiro would definitely hold him to his false promises.

The thought turned his stomach.

He would rather die a thousand deaths—spend a dozen eternities in hell—than father an aberration of nature with the vile female demon. In fact, he would rather enter Ademordna’s throne room every day and night until the end of time than enter Noiro’s malevolent body even once. He shook off the thought. His plan would work.

It had to work.

She was staring at him with a combined look of both rage and terror in her eyes, and her hair began to sway about her shoulders, not in a beautiful, lustrous way but like a bundle of snakes wriggling about her misshapen head. “Shh,” he whispered again, reaching out to cup her slimy chin in his hand. Ever since he had scolded her about changing her appearance so often, she had come to him wearing her true face and persona: a serpent-looking atrocity with wide nostrils and a forked tongue. While it was almost unbearable to look upon her, it was necessary in convincing the desperate creature that he had truly come to want her—exactly as she was.

All part of the mind game, the web he was weaving, to get home to Deanna.

He ran his finger gently along the line of her jaw, leaned in slowly, and placed a chaste kiss on her lips, lingering just long enough to make her want for more. “A kiss for the first talisman. I said I would give you what you need, and I will.”

She looked surprised then. Pleased, if not wary.

“But,” he added quickly, “not until I have what I need.”

She slowly licked her lips, and her narrow, forked tongue almost made him heave, but he suppressed the urge without revealing his disgust. “And what is it that you need, sweet wizard?” She ran her hand suggestively along his inner thigh, first the back of her fingers and then the pads.

Nachari used an ardor spell to force his manhood to respond. It wasn’t arousal, simply a biologic redirection of blood flow. When she drew back in utter delight and laughed, he lowered his voice to a soothing, seductive tone. “I need you…” He lifted his hand to trace the outline of a jutting nipple, erect at the apex of a heaving breast, and stopped just short of making contact. He brushed her hair behind her shoulder instead. “To give me…” He ran his hand along her shoulder, down her spindly arm to her waist, and pressed it firmly against her lower belly.

“Yes,” she whispered, breathlessly.

He sat back on the bed, resting on his elbows. “…the remaining three talismans I asked for: a snake, a scorpion, and a spider from the remaining three provinces.” He licked his lips slowly and smiled that infamous Silivasi smile—a gift rarely bestowed upon the wicked hag. “The timing of all of this is really up to you.”

Noiro shook her head vigorously, as if coming out of a trance, and if truth be told, she was coming out of a spell of sorts. Despite the errant, uncooperative energy of the Abyss—the contrary laws of physics that rendered Nachari’s magic too ineffective to control the barbaric machinations of his eager tormentors while he was under their constraint—his powers had grown astonishingly strong during his horrific stay in hell. The demon lords had managed to do more than the entire council of wizards at the Romanian University during Nachari’s 400 years of study: They had forced him to retreat within; challenged him to create powerful alchemy using inferior elements; taught him the very patience, focus, and creativity that only came with centuries of practice. They had allowed him to channel pain into power.

They had turned him into an even greater, more powerful wizard.

Noiro was a deity.

An immortal lord of the underworld, wholly evil and without conscience, yet she bent to his will like putty beneath his hands. Despite all the years of being told of his incomparable beauty, his devastating effect on women, Nachari Silivasi knew that there was only one thing responsible for the successful manipulation he had achieved with Noiro.

Magick.

Deep. Powerful. And growing.

His
.

“You will bring me these soon?” he whispered.

Norio shut her eyes and swayed back and forth, his words washing over her like molten liquid in a golden stream. “Should my lover wish it, I would bring you the head of our Supreme Ruler, Ademordna himself.”

Nachari stared into Noiro’s eyes, reading her sincerity, not daring to look away or break the connection.

If only it were that easy.

If only Noiro possessed the power to challenge the King of the Middle Kingdom of the Valley of Death and Shadows, his tormentor and relentless captor, to destroy his greatest enemy—

But she didn’t.

Not by a long shot.

Still, there was no point in telling her that now. She would need such bold arrogance to complete the tasks he had given her. And there was no time like the present.

“I’ll let you know if it comes to that, sweet love,” he whispered. “But for now, bring what I’ve asked.”

fifteen

Dark Moon Vale ~ Two weeks later

Deanna looked into Kagen’s bottomless dark brown eyes, each shimmering with reflections of silver light, and searched for reassurance. While his handsome, kind features were shadowed with both concern and compassion, he simply couldn’t give her the guarantee she needed: that she would come through the conversion just fine and everything would be all right in the end.

She looked at the sterile hospital gurney and the taut leather straps where her ankles, thighs, wrists, and forearms would be bound and felt her body begin to tremble. “Are you really sure those are necessary?”

Kagen glanced at his brother Nathaniel, who quickly looked away. And didn’t that just tell her all she needed to know. “Unless you allow me to…hold you, they are.” His voice was tender but matter-of-fact.

Deanna nodded then. Kagen had offered to take Nachari’s place, in a manner of speaking, to position his body behind hers with his arms and legs wrapped firmly around her in order to provide the necessary restraint for the conversion, but she had refused the offer.

It wasn’t that she didn’t want the assistance.

Hell, it wasn’t that she didn’t need the constant contact, the comfort.

But it just didn’t feel right.

It would just be too intimate, and she felt like she owed more…devotion to Nachari. “No, that’s okay. We’ll try it this way,” she said.

Nathaniel whistled low beneath his breath and then looked at her apologetically: He obviously hadn’t meant to make the sound. “If it gets…too rough…Deanna, then either myself or Kagen will release the bindings and hold you, instead.” He paused as if searching for an adequate explanation. “You can’t expect us just to watch…without helping in whatever way we can.”

Her smile was faint. “Yeah, okay.” She glanced at the clinic door then. “Where is Jocelyn?” She looked at her watch—for the tenth time. “She said she’d be here.”

By the look on Nathaniel’s face, it was obvious that he was speaking to his
destiny
telepathically. After a short pause, he said, “Looks like she got held up in her self-defense class, but she’s on her way.” He paused, listening. “She says she’ll be here in five minutes.”

Deanna swallowed hard and looked at the hospital bed—at the magnificent male who was lying so serenely beneath the crisp white sheets—and took a deep breath.

She couldn’t believe this was happening.

That the actual conversion was about to take place.

That she had committed her life, her future, and even her species—changing from human to Vampyr—into a beautiful stranger’s hands, when she hadn’t even met him.

She swallowed convulsively, bearing down on her resolve. The decision to go through with it had been primarily hers. While Marquis would have forced the issue earlier—all of Nachari’s brothers believed the transition would make a difference; if nothing else, the sharing of DNA might provide Deanna with critical information about Nachari: where he was and what was happening to him, what was still keeping him away—the Ancient Master Warrior had backed off at the request of his younger siblings. They all wanted Deanna to come to Nachari of her own free will.

And she had.

Or at least, she was about to do just that.

She turned away as Kagen checked the connections on the intricate medical apparatus a final time. The seamless appearance of two razor-sharp incisors elongating beneath the Master Wizard’s upper lip, following an injection of some sort of stimulant, had already unsettled Deanna enough. It wasn’t like she hadn’t seen fangs on Kagen, Nathaniel, and Marquis a time or two during her stay in Dark Moon Vale, but seeing them on Nachari—well, that was an entirely different matter.

It just brought it all home.

Made it all too real.

Nachari Silivasi
was
a vampire.

And gods willing, by the end of this procedure, she would be a vampire too—converted by this mysterious male, whom she’d never even met, with the help of his brother, the vampire Healer.

The catheters that protruded from beneath the extended fangs were equipped with a tiny pump, intended to extract venom directly from Nachari’s glands, carry it along a short, narrow tube, and infuse it into a small port that led to Deanna’s internal jugular vein for however long the conversion took.

Anxious tears threatened Deanna’s eyes.
Oh, God, please don’t let me panic
, she thought, staring once more at the clinic door. Weighing one last time whether to stay or run.

“Deanna.” Kagen’s soft voice interrupted her thoughts.

“Huh?” she asked, turning around to face him. He had the necessary tubing in his hands. “Why don’t we go ahead and prepare the central line while we wait for Jocelyn.”

Deanna looked at the intimidating apparatus and swallowed a lump in her throat. “Yeah, uh, okay.”

Nathaniel practically glided across the floor in that sinewy, cat-like way that he always had, and placed a steadying hand on her shoulder. “Sister,
breathe
.” She felt a powerful influx of relaxing energy flow through her as a result of Nathaniel’s touch, and it allowed her body to relax for the first time. “This part will be painless—I will see to it,” he reassured her.

Deanna nodded gratefully, wishing she was a little less squeamish around needles and blood…

Not to mention fangs…and vampires.

As Nathaniel promised, the procedure was utterly painless—and not because Kagen was such a great Healer, although according to everyone she had met, he was. The procedure was painless because Nathaniel was absorbing all of the sensations into his own body for her, the Vampyr method for blocking pain.

She watched in apt fascination as the Ancient Master Warrior stood perfectly still and relaxed, showing no sign whatsoever of the pain he was absorbing on her behalf.

Somehow, the gesture gave her courage: If he could do it, maybe so could she.

The door to the room flew open, and Jocelyn rushed in with a look of flushed apology on her face. “Hey, Deanna.” She dropped her purse on a nearby chair and rushed across the room to give her a hug, careful to avoid the newly appointed apparatus. “I’m so sorry I’m late. It couldn’t be avoided.” She drew back and held both of Deanna’s shoulders in a firm but gentle grip. “How are you holding up?”

Deanna frowned. “Kind of like a prisoner about to face the gallows. I’m a mess.”

Jocelyn looked up at Nathaniel with an inquisitive look on her face.

“We’re doing all we can, my love,” he assured her. He turned to Deanna then. “We will do all we can until the procedure is complete.”

Jocelyn turned back to Deanna and raised an eyebrow. “Marquis?”

Deanna grimaced, feeling a little guilty. “Kagen asked him to wait outside the room—at my request.” She shrugged apologetically while glancing from one brother to the next. “I am sorry about that; he’s just…so intense, you know?”

Nathaniel chuckled lightheartedly. “No worries, little sister. We will all be more relaxed without Marquis’s…loving scrutiny.”

Kagen chuckled himself then. “Well put.”

A strange vibration swept through the room, and Deanna somehow knew that the brothers were answering for their recent comments telepathically; Marquis might not be physically in the room, but one could best believe, he wasn’t far away in his mind.

Kagen stepped away from the gurney and dimmed the lights. As if on cue, Nathaniel strode to the far side of the room and sat down in a comfortable armchair—one Kagen had brought into the exam room for just this purpose. There was also an empty chair beside Nathaniel for Jocelyn, in case she needed a break at some point, and Kagen? Well, he was not about to leave his baby brother’s side until the last drop of venom had passed into his
destiny
—a commitment Deanna was completely grateful for.

Jocelyn gave her hand a gentle squeeze. “I’m right here,” she whispered. Somehow, her voice was not as steady as before.

Before Deanna could respond, Kagen rounded the foot of Nachari’s bed, where Deanna was sitting, stopped, and knelt in front of her. “Sister,” he whispered, almost reverently.

She looked him in the eyes; they were practically glowing. “Yes?”

He whispered something beautiful yet foreign in an ancient language, and then he took both of her hands in his and repeated it in English. “You are Nachari’s
blood destiny
,” he said in a ceremonious voice, “the other half of his soul. You are the love he has waited a lifetime to find. The gift he will, gods willing, spend a lifetime trying to become worthy of. Your heart was revealed beneath the Blood Moon, your spirit chosen by the god Perseus, the Victorious Hero, to be honored, cherished, and favored by him—above and beyond all others—for all eternity. Do you accept this as your true destiny?”